Windows 8.1 Battery Life Benchmark

When it comes to mobility and Windows 8.1, it’s all about the battery life. Nobody would want to see their laptops or tablets shut down in the middle of a movie or while browsing the internet for an important information.

The guys at Anandtech performed some tests on a Sony VAIO Pro 13 to determine the battery life in Windows 8.1. For the test, they used a 1080p MP4 video (having 2.03 Mbps MP4 with an AVC High L4.1 profile video stream and a 93.8 Kbps 2-channel AAC audio stream to be more precise) and played it on MPCHC, VLC, Windows Media Player and the Modern UI Video app.

The results are as following:

As show above, MPCHC is the least optimized for MKV playback, sucking up the most battery out of your system. Moving upwards, we see VLC doing a bit better, having 7% more ground than the MPCHC but not so good when switching to lower bitrate, in which case MPCHC takes the lead.

Windows Media Player surprisingly managed to score 418 minutes, 32% more than MPCHC and 36% better than VLC. The Video app takes the lead in the end by 13% compared to the classical Windows Media Player and a staggering 50% to 54% lead when looking back at the MPCHC and VLC.

In terms of Metro UI and Desktop modes, the Video app does not show a considerable difference, it is measured at 2%, but if you want to squeeze that 15 minutes out of a movie, Metro UI mode is the solution.